Friday, October 31, 2014

A Ride in the Reconstruction Zone, part 3

From the September 2011 E-Block.

***As in our last installment, my reading of the second half of Rushdoony's Roots of Reconstruction
has produced none of the controversy that I would have expected from
all the naughty things I have read about him from certain disgruntled
sources. There is still no promise to reinstitute stoning as a penalty
if Christians get in charge. Nor is there yet anything objectionable in
moral terms.

There is also, as yet, still very little in terms of specifics of
how Rushdoony sees Christians taking dominion over all aspects of life.
He tells us (552), "Christainity has an obligation to train people in
the fundamentals of God's grace and law, and to make them active and
able champions of true political liberty and order." All right -- how?
We're not told; all we have in RR is a strong emphasis on construction
of Christian schools, but the means of instruction for "people" at large
is not specified. We are told that we should tithe to support
reconstruction (608) but other than for schools, if you're looking to be
told how to spend it, you won't find it here. We are told we ought to
make television a Christian domain (1102) but not told how either. Buy
all the stations with tithe money and replace the programming? Take over
the FCC? "The state cannot be neutral towards God." (907), we are told.
All right -- so must it be a theocracy? Must all politicians be
Christians? I don't wish to seem facetious, but the weight of "do this"
that is unbalanced by the lack of a "tell me how" becomes disgruntling
after a while, as it leaves far too much to the imagination.

There are also some interesting parallels to today's problems of
the church; again I can only imagine how much worse Rushdoony would say
things are now. At one point he appears to be taking on (564) an earlier
version of the emergent church. Later (582) he refers to churchgoers
who "sit under pastors who know less Bible and doctrine than they do"
(ouch -- how well I know that). And it is not only pastors (755): he has
a few words for Christians who substitute "emotionalism and enthusiasm
for discipline and work." He minces no words even for the greatest names;
he refers to Billy Graham as a compromiser and charges him (689) with
adhering to "basic humanism". How can I of all people dislike someone
for being this straightforward?

So are there any problems to report? Well, yes. I have noted
Rushdoony's sparse documentation at times, and I selected three claims
at random to check for validity.

(570) He reports that two Nigerian personalities, Sir Ahmado
Bello and Sir Abubaker, on January 15, 1965, were eaten by cannibals at a
state dinner. This doesn't check out at all; Bello's death was one year
later (January 15, 1966) and he was murdered in a coup. I can find no
indication that his body was consumed by cannibals. Abubaker was killed
in the same coup, and it appears that his corpse was found by a roadside
and put in a tomb, not eaten.

(589) He reports that on January 31, 1967, Lois Murgenstrumm was
used as a living altar in a Satanist wedding. This claim is repeated
without documentation in some sources of questionable reliability.
Perhaps it simply is too old to be on the radar today, but it smells
suspicious.

(1021) He says that a Declaration of Mental Independence was
delivered in 1825, by one Robert Owen, founder of a sort of humanist
colony. He also reports a visitor to the colony, Gabriel Rey, who saw a
mired horse that was left to die. On this one the year is repeated
differently in different sources (one said 1826, another 1829) but it
does appear that Owen did deliver such an address. On the other hand, I
cannot find any confirmation of the Rey aspect of the story.

So what does that leave us? It's not certain, especially since
the book gives no source for these claims. They may seem trivial as
claims, but they do raise questions in my mind about how reliable
Rushdoony's research may be.